


Awakenings

by lost_spook



Category: Doctor Who (1963), Sapphire and Steel
Genre: Community: whoniverse1000, Crossover, Elemental Weirdness, Episode Tag, Other, Robots, Serial: s090 The Robots of Death, Telepathy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-27
Updated: 2011-11-27
Packaged: 2017-10-26 14:29:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/284354
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lost_spook/pseuds/lost_spook
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>D84 is mended and Silver gets more than he bargained for.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Awakenings

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a bonus fill for the prompt D84/Poul on Whoniverse1000. Because.
> 
> One vague spoiler for Robots of Death.

There is light and sound and he is functioning again, at least in part. That is not possible. D84 is not yet fully operational, but he knows that. Nevertheless, he is here; aware. And he is also aware of another presence, both within and without. “Doctor?”

“Well, you could say that, I suppose,” says a voice that is familiar but incorrect. Deft, long fingers run down his arm, over his mask of a face. “My, my, you really _are_ something special, aren’t you?”

Optical and audio functions are being restored. He registers the human kneeling beside him, although something is still not correct. “Poul.”

“What?” the red-haired human turns his head to look down at him with a frown. “That’s odd. I thought I’d got everything working. I have, I’m sure.”

He states a fact: “I should not be here.”

“Yes,” says the man who is and isn’t Poul. “That _is_ true, but it would have been a crime to leave you lying there. I’d appreciate it if you didn’t mention it to Diamond. You’re _not_ part of this ridiculous non-assignment, you see, so-” He gives an expressive shrug. “In many ways, she’s a thousand times worse than -” He stops, but it is then that D84 registers again that this being is also inside his circuitry, for he hears the unspoken word and the darkness that goes with it: _Steel_.

“You were damaged. Broken. I am sorry.”

“I -?” The man stops and moves to put his hands over D84’s silver ones. “Broken? I think not. Never broken.”

The man is not Poul. D84’s full abilities are returning, little by little and he can scan the being next to him. He is not a man. He is… It is not possible, his artificial brain concludes again.

 _No_ , says the voice in his head in wry amusement. _No, I daresay it is not. I am Silver, and you are lucky I found you. Nobody else could have brought you back._ (It is another fact. It is also a boast.)

D84 analyses the available data and still nothing makes sense. “I… do not understand. How am I here? Where is Taren Capel?”

“Oh, my _dear_ fellow, you are so very much more than they realise, aren’t you?” He is closer again, here in this room, and also as a dancing, sparkling presence within D84’s every component. “You want to understand, don’t you? Yes. Oh, I know.”

There is a sense somewhere of millennia of watching from the outside. It gives a name to the elusive thoughts D84 had believed were quirks and faults: it is an emotion, it is loneliness and longing. Humans are the ultimate mystery. So obvious, crude and short-lived; yet so triumphantly illogical, full of passions and contradictions. So easily seen through and yet forever unknowable.

 _I’m not sure I’d go_ quite _so far myself_. Silver’s amusement is a strange sensation inside an artificial mind that has never known laughter. _Allow me to satisfy a little of your curiosity_. He puts a hand again to D84’s face. It is an unnecessary gesture, but made with a certain precision, as if he is a surgeon carrying out an operation. There is no pointless human warmth in it.

D84 can see what Silver means to show him: the scene he came upon in the all but deserted Storm Mine, and the disruption to time he was sent to check long gone (same readings yet _again_ , how tedious), and how he re-formed him from what was left, but D84 catches hold of the being’s free hand with one of his own, tightening his hold and seeking more with a sudden and insatiable need for new ways of interpreting the information he has accumulated - ways that he can so very nearly glimpse now – and more, _more_ …

It is only too easy to explore new territory; silver is highly conductive. D84 is programmed to investigate, and this being is a mystery and there is also an unexpected kinship. Somewhere, though there have been thousands of years that have since passed, Silver is a created being with a purpose and programming of his own. D84 sees and knows other times and other worlds; lights and colours; the intricacies of strange technologies, their most intimate atomic structures. It is dizzying, exhilarating.

Yet there is always an overriding purpose, always what must be done and the darkness and danger and pain of it is threaded through everything else: the distractions, the pleasure, the baubles he admires; everything that he does ( _oh the things he can do_ ); the dance that is his existence – and those things he would rather his fellow Elements did _not_ know that he had tried in order to counteract that –

“Yes, and I _would_ be grateful if you didn’t mention any of _this_ to Diamond, either,” says Silver, and suddenly D84 has lost his hold on him, both his hand and his mind.

D84 knows he has trespassed, but Silver only sounds amused again, not angry.

“You are quite magnificent,” the Element continues. “I am afraid that we should not have, ah, gone quite so far, but don’t worry. I don’t imagine the humans here will ever work out how much you outclass even the smartest and newest SuperVoc.”

“It was… wrong. I was not… invited.”

“You obeyed your programming, as must we all,” says Silver, packing up a small, neat case of tools by his side. “It was unexpected, but de _light_ ful. You did nothing wrong. I, on the other hand -.” He smiles and shrugs. “I don’t think I need include this in my debriefing.”

“I stole… I stole information.”

“No. You did considerably more than simply _take_ ,” Silver assures him. “Now, I must go. I to my purpose, and you to yours.”

He leans over briefly and places an unsentimental kiss on D84’s chilly forehead. It is an act that should be illogical, from one such being to another, but D84 understands now that it has a logic all its own; a new and perfect logic.


End file.
